ERP systems manage the resources of an organisation, from the financial through personnel, project management, manufacturing, sales, service, customer relations management systems, document management, itinerary planning and such various other functions as the enterprise requires.
An ERP system typically is made up of a transactional database with software modules to handle one or more of the functions required. Interaction with the modules is typically by a web interface and the database and modules may be part of a cloud computing system.
The present invention is intended to deal with the situation in which an enterprise employee, manager or director is remote from the enterprise base. In such a situation the person has expenses which are paid by and should be recorded by the enterprise. This may prove difficult, requiring the collecting of receipts by the person concerned and the subsequent recording of these in the ERP system.
The use of credit cards reduces the problems to some extent but the recorded transaction may not reflect what is actually happening and typically requires reconciliation after the travel is completed.
Various efforts have been made to resolve some of the problems associated with recording expenses for a remote traveller. Among these are:
Patent application US20110119179 relates to processing payment transactions between enterprise resource planning systems and particularly relates to the conversion of the invoice format between the two systems.
Patent application US 2003/0046104 relates to a method for the approval of expense applications in which the expense is automatically approved if it falls within specified parameters.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,865,411 relates to an accounts payable process in which details from an invoice are matched against a purchase order.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,957,718 relates to a method and apparatus for telecommunication expense management which provides a pop-up query when a call is completed in order to allocate the expense of the call.
Patent application US 2007/0083401 relates to travel and expense management. The specification describes a travel approval system centrally storing travel data and integrated with the travelling users.
Patent application US 2005/0015316 A1 Methods for calendaring, tracking, and expense reporting, and devices and devices and systems employing same (abandoned 2008). The specification describes a system which stores an itinerary, tracks the traveller along points on the itinerary both physically and by time and automatically assigns expenses to appointments on that itinerary. The system is traveller centric but has an enterprise centralised computer system.
Such systems leave unanswered the question as to how the system ensures that the costs recorded are correct and how to reduce to a minimum the travelers interaction with payment systems during travel.
Also well known is the NFC (Near Field Communication) communications protocol which uses the NDEF protocol for the two way transfer of data between two devices by RFID tag transmissions. The protocol works by induction when two such devices are within a short distance of each other, typically 4 cm to 20 cm, and automatically establishes a connection between them. It is known that the NFC system may be used for contactless payment systems, see for instance U.S. Pat. No. 8,215,546.
There remains the problem of ensuring that the ERP system correctly records and allocates the expenses of a remote traveller.
The present invention provides a solution to this and other problems which offers advantages over the prior art or which will at least provide the public with a useful choice.
All references, including any patents or patent applications cited in this specification are hereby incorporated by reference. No admission is made that any reference constitutes prior art. The discussion of the references states what their authors assert, and the applicants reserve the right to challenge the accuracy and pertinency of the cited documents. It will be clearly understood that, although a number of prior art publications are referred to herein, this reference does not constitute an admission that any of these documents form part of the common general knowledge in the art, in New Zealand or in any other country.
A reference to an “NFC” equipped device refers to a device which can communicate using a Near Field Communication protocol.
A reference to an “ERP” is a reference to an Enterprise Resource Planning system including at least an accounting system and a corporate travel planning system including itinerary planning and expenditure capability.
A reference herein to an itinerary “event” is a reference to a point at which there is a notable occurrence in the itinerary of a traveller. Such events may include points in space and time at which: a mode of transport changes (from aircraft to foot, from foot to taxi, from taxi to foot, from foot to rail); at which a payment is received, made or committed to (porters tip, meal expenditure, taxi charge, check out); at which a specific communication is received or made (aircraft gate check-in, phone initiated parking charge) or other occurrences which have relevance to the incurring of debt or the receiving of income as recorded in an ERP system.